HEART 

of 

LINCOLN 




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THE HEART OF LINCOLN 



THE 
HEART OF LINCOLN 



THE SOUL OF THE MAN AS 

REVEALED IN STORY 

AND ANECDOTE 



BY 

WAYNE WHIPPLE 

AUTHOR OF "THE STORY LIFE OF 
WASHINGTON," ETC. 




PHILADELPHIA 
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 



COPYRIGHT, 1915. BY GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY. 
PUBLISHED AUGUST, 1915 



All rights reserved 
Printed in U. S. A. 

0<c / . 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 



THE MOTHER-HEART 

Over a hundred years ago a little 
heart began to beat in a log liovel in the 
backwoods of Kentucky — a heart that 
was to grow big and swell with the 
hopes and throb with the griefs of the 
nation and of the whole world. But 
its mother 

"Gave us Lincoln and never knew/* 

It is doubtful if poor Tom Lincoln's 
wife ever raised her eyes in faith — as 
many a mother does hope against hope 
— that her son might become the first 
man in the neighborhood or nation. 
There seemed to be nothing ahead in 
the hard, barren lot of her little baby 
7 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

boy for Nancy Hanks Lincoln to keep 
and ponder in her heart. Nancy was, 
"according to her hghts," a God-fear- 
ing woman. She would have been full 
content to have this baby grow up a 
good boy, kind to his father and mother 
and sister Sarah, and good to their 
backwoods neighbors, so few and far 
between. 

Thomas Lincoln, the child's fatlier, 
was a tough, hearty, well-meaning, 
shiftless, thriftless man whom his wife 
had taught, after their marriage, to 
scrawl his own name. 

In their crude, primitive way, Tom 
and Nancy Lincoln were religious. 
They went to camp-meeting together 
when pioneer preachers like Peter 
Cart Wright held forth with such vim 
and power that sinners, "under convic- 
tion," writhed on the ground and 
finally came out shouting victory over 
sin. Both the Lincoln baby's parents 
8 



THE MOTHER-HEART 

had **got the power" more than once. 
Thomas's rehgion was so practical that 
Dennis Hanks, a relative of his wife, 
said of him: 

"Tom thought a heap o' Nancy, an' 
he was as good to her as he knowed how. 
He didn't drink or swear or play cyards 
or fight — an' them was drinkin', cussin', 
quarrelsome days. Tom was popy- 
lar, an' he could lick a bully if he had 
to." 

Both the Lincoln boy's parents be- 
lieved in and talked about the heart 
life. They had heard all about "ex- 
perimental religion" at camp-meeting. 
So, whatever else Abraham Lincoln 
may have lacked in his backwoods life, 
he did have true heart culture. His 
mother, in her humble way, builded bet- 
ter than she knew — a palace instead of 
the comfortable cabin she longed for all 
her sad, disappointed days and nights, 
by teaching little Abe to be good and 
9 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

kind and true. She would have been 
happy if she could have known that her 
son would grow to be a local exhorter 
or a pioneer preacher. Yet out of her 
ignorance and privations she gave her 
child the master-key to the grandest life 
of practical religion ever worked out in 
a human career. 

Even the dull, hard days of Lincoln's 
childliood radiated with the warmth of 
his boyish heart. He was happy with 
his sister, two years older, and Sarah 
was always proud of her brother. 
Their mother used to read to them in 
the lonely twilight hours from the Bible, 
"The Pilgrim's Progress," and others 
of the few books to be had in the back- 
woods of Kentucky in those days. 

Little Abe, only five or six years old, 
would work hard and long, chopping, 
tugging and lugging home spicewood 
branches that would make the firelight 
brighter and give out a pleasant smell 
10 



THE MOTHER-HEART 

while their mother read to them. The 
brightness and sweetness of those early 
memories remained with Lincoln al- 
ways. 

When he was only nine, a year or so 
after the removal of the Lincoln fam- 
ily to Indiana, he came to know the 
utter desolation of home without a 
mother. Nancy Lincoln was taken 
with a strange and terrible disease 
which smote the early settlers. They 
called it "the milk-sick" because it at- 
tacked the cattle also. The mother 
knew at once that she was doomed to 
die. Calling Sarah and Abraham to 
the side of her rough bed of poles, bark 
and leaves, she made them promise to 
be good to each other and take care of 
their poor father. 

Little Abe helped the heartbroken 
Tom saw the rough boards out of trees 
to make a rude coffin, and they buried 
11 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

the body of the good wife and mother 
"without benefit of clergy." Cousin 
Dennis Hanks related of little Abe: 

"Sometimes he would write with a 
piece of charcoal on the point of a burnt 
stick, on the fence or floor. We got a 
little paper at the country town and I 
made ink out of blackberry briar root 
and a little copperas in it. I made his 
first pen out of a turkey-buzzard 
feather. Sometimes he would write 
with a stick in the white sand down by 
the crick bank, and leave it till the 
waves would blot it out." 

It is said that the first letter the boy 
ever wrote was to beseech old "Parson" 
Elkin, who had known their mother in 
their "old Kentucky home," to come 
and preach a sermon over his mother's 
grass-grovni grave in the edge of the 
clearing. This the good old man did 
the following summer. No wonder the 
12 



THE MOTHER-HEART 

thoughtful, grateful little boy held such 
a mother in loving remembrance, ex- 
claiming fervently to a friend long 
afterward : 

"All I am or hope to be I owe to my 
sainted mother!" 



13 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

Thomas Lincoln, the widower, was 
lonety, restless and moody. All that 
two children of nine and eleven could 
do, Abraham and Sarali did to comfort 
and cheer their forlorn father. But he 
disappeared one day and was gone sev- 
eral weeks, — on a longer hunting trip 
than usual, the children thought. 
When he returned he brought a new 
mother with three children of her own. 
The Lincoln boy soon learned to love 
his stepmother, who was not long in 
finding out that *'Abe was no common 
boy." Many years later the second 
Mrs. Lincoln said of her illustrious 
stepson : 

**I can say what scarcely one mother 
in a thousand can say — Abe never gave 
14 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

me a cross word or look, and never re- 
fused, in fact or appearance, to do any- 
thing I asked him. I had a son Jolm, 
who was raised with Abe. Both were 
good bo3^s, but I must say, both being 
now dead, that Abe was the best boy 
I ever saw or expect to see." 

Mrs. Sarah Lincobi had good reason 
to speak in the highest praise of young 
Abraham's devotion. He never ceased 
to be grateful for her sympathy and 
kindness to him, as a boy, encouraging 
him to read and study, and persuading 
his father to let him go to school a few 
weeks now and then. Tom Lincoln 
and the rough neighbors, in their igno- 
rance, thought Abe took to reading 
books only to shirk work. His father 
thought his longing to go to school was 
a sign of "pure laziness." So he took 
him out of school, when he allowed him 
to go at all, for the smallest reasons. 
Strong as Abe was, and work as hard 
15 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

as he might, he could never earn more 
than twenty-five or thirty cents a day. 
This pitiful pay his father always took 
and kept. 

Most youths would have left home in 
disgust, but Abraham stood by, help- 
ing heroically and making his step- 
mother's hard life with his shiftless 
father comfortable and even cheer- 
ful. 

Little as he was permitted to go to 
school there are many stories told of 
Abe Lincoln's doings there — not mis- 
chievous acts, nor even prodigies of 
learning, but deeds of kindness to 
everj^body. His first "composition" 
was an earnest appeal against cruelty 
to animals. 

He was always the champion of the 
helpless, no matter how humble the ob- 
ject of any ill-treatment might be. 
One day he came and caught a group 
16 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

of mischievous boys putting live coals 
on a poor mud-turtle's back. The lads, 
and several girl friends, laughed to see 
the turtle moving slowly and aimlessly 
about in its surprise and misery. 
When Abe Lincoln saw what was going 
on he dashed into the group in a frenzy 
of wrath, snatched the shingle from the 
ringleader's hand, dashed the burning 
coals off the poor turtle's back, then be- 
gan beating the boys with the thin 
board. When he had scattered them 
right and left, according to one of the 
girls who witnessed the sudden scene, 
"he preached against such cruelty" and, 
with angry tears in his deep gray eyes, 
told the snickering offenders that a ter- 
rapin's or "an ant's life is as sweet to 
it as ours is to us." 

Abraham's heart ached for the un- 
fortunate, especially when others held 
aloof and said they deserved their lot. 
17 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

Late one cold night he, with several 
cronies, found a man they knew lying 
drunk in the freezing mud beside the 
road. 

"He has made his bed," said the other 
fellows, "now let him lie in it." 

But to Abe this seemed monstrous. 
The rest went on to their homes and 
left him to his thankless task. The 
poor drunkard might freeze to death if 
left as he was. But he was big and 
heavy — a dead weight. One of his 
friends described this act of mercy: 

"Abe, seeing he was to have no help, 
bent his mighty frame, and, taking the 
big man in his long arms, carried him 
a great distance to Dennis Hanks's 
cabin. There he built a fire, warmed, 
and rubbed, and nursed him through 
the entire night. The man often told 
John Hanks that it was 'mighty clever 
in Abe to tote me to a warm fire that 
cold night,' and was very sure that 
18 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

Abe's strength and benevolence had 
saved his hfe." 

He could not see any one in need of 
help without doing all he could to ren- 
der aid. They used to laugh about his 
appearing just in time (he was not in 
school then) to prompt Kate Robey, 
the ''pretty girl" of the place, whom they 
said Abe was "sweet on." The word 
was "defied." The class had spelled it 
every way but the right way and 
Schoolmaster Crawford was so indig- 
nant with them all that he had an- 
nounced that if some one did not spell 
the word right he would keep all of 
them in after school. Miss Robey, the 
last in the class, was essaying the word, 
slowly feeling her way along: "d-e-f-" 
she had said and was about to add a 
hesitant "y," when, as she herself re- 
lated — "I saw Lincoln at the window; 
he had his finger in his eye and a smile 
on his face ; I immediately took the hint 
19 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

that I must change the letter y into an 
L Hence I spelled the word — the class 
let out. I felt grateful to Lincoln for 
this simple thing." 

Schoolmaster Crawford was not the 
Crawford who lent Abe the copy of 
Weems's *'Life of Washington" which 
he read nearly all night before the blaz- 
ing fire, then went to bed, laying it in 
a chink in the mortar between the logs 
beside his humble bed, to resume the 
reading as soon as it was light enough. 
A storai came up in the night and the 
book was soaked with rain and muddy 
mortar. This Mr. Crawford, known 
to the neighbors as "Old Blue-Nose," 
made young Lincoln buy the old book 
at a high price and "pull fodder" three 
days at twenty-five cents a day to pay 
for it! 

Abe afterward worked for this hard 
master, as a farm hand, while his sister 
20 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

Sarah was there. A friend wrote of 
young Lincoln's employment at Jo- 
siah Craw^ford's: "Abe was reconciled 
to his situation in this family by the 
presence of his sister, and the oppor- 
tunity it gave him of being in the com- 
pany of Mrs. Crawford, for whom he 
had a genuine attachment." 

This lady told many stories of Lin- 
coln's sojourn under her roof. "Abe 
was a sensitive lad, never coming where 
he was not wanted." . • . "He was 
tender and kind," like his sister, who 
was at the same time her maid-of-all- 
work. Mrs. Crawford said also that 
"he always lifted his hat and bowed 
when he made his appearance." And 
she related how, when he "went to see 
the girls," he brought in the biggest 
backlog and made the brightest fire; 
and how the young people, sitting 
around it, watching the way the sparks 
flew, told their fortunes. He helped 
21 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 



pare apples, shell corn and crack 
nuts. 

The sports he preferred were those 
that brought men together, the spelling- 
school, the husking bee, the "raising"; 
of all these he was the life by his wit, 
his stories, his good nature, his dog- 
gerel verses, his practical jokes, and by 
a rough kind of politeness. 

The other boys went hunting, of 
course. But young Lincoln's sympa- 
thy for the helpless creatures made him 
a poor sportsman. He could not kill 
or maim the humblest of God's crea- 
tures. In one of his short autobiogra- 
phies he referred to himself in the third 
person : 

"A few days before the completion 
of his eighth year, in the absence of his 
father, a flock of wild turkeys ap- 
proached the new log cabin ; and Abra- 
ham, standing inside, shot through a 
22 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

crack and killed one of them. He has 
never since pulled the trigger on any- 
larger game." 

This was when scruples about inflict- 
ing suffering on the lower orders of 
creation were thought to be a sickly sort 
of sentimentalism. But young Lin- 
coln's heart could never see suffering 
without yearning to bring relief. 

While the family were moving to 
Illinois they found that, after their 
heavy wagon, drawn by two yoke of 
oxen, had crossed an ice-filled stream, 
they had left a little dog on the other 
side. It was late; to turn back with 
their clumsy team and lumbering wagon 
was out of the question. Night was 
coming on. The rest of the migrating 
family were in favor of going on and 
leaving "the little nuisance" to his fate. 
But Abe could see the dog running up 
and down the opposite bank, yelping in 
23 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

distress. Long afterward, describing 
this incident. President Lincoln said: 
"I could not bear the idea of aban- 
doning even a dog. Pulling off shoes 
and socks, I waded across the stream, 
and triumphantly returned with the 
shivering animal under my arm. His 
frantic leaps of joy and other evidences 
of a dog's gratitude amply repaid me 
for all the exposure I had undergone." 

Abraham made thirty dollars ped- 
dhng "notions" on their way from In- 
diana to Illinois. Although he had 
"turned twenty-one" on the way, he 
seems to have given that precious sum 
— amounting to much more in those 
days than now — to make his father, who 
had always kept his meager earnings, 
and his stej)mother more comfortable. 
He would not leave them, though the 
stepmother's children were able and 
should have provided for her, until he 
24 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

and John Hanks had helped raise a 
commodious cabin, cleared and plowed 
fifteen acres around it, and fenced it in 
with the black walnut rails which after- 
wards became world-famous. It was a 
few of those historic fence rails that 
pried Abraham Lincoln into the presi- 
dency of the United States. Of 
course, nothing was farther than the 
presidency from his thoughts while he 
was doing his utmost to help the father 
who had always been mean to him, called 
him lazy, and sneered at his desire to 
"get an eddication." 

After settling his family in comfort 
young Lincoln hovered near, splitting 
rails for a neighbor to earn enough cot- 
ton *' jeans," dyed with butternut stain, 
to make his "freedom suit" of clothes. 
This was his preparation for that fa- 
mous "winter of the deep snow," one of 
the coldest and hardest winters known 
even in those days. 

25 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

When the dutiful and forgiving son 
had estabhshed his reputation for kind- 
ness in New Salem, and had been 
elected to the Legislature of the State; 
had been influential in having the capi- 
tal of Illinois removed from Vandalia 
to Springfield and had been practising 
law in Springfield, a former fellow 
clerk, William G. Greene, paid a visit 
to Thomas Lincoln, still living in a log 
hut in Coles Coimty. Old Tom Lin- 
coln even then inveighed against his 
son's studious ways. He said to 
Greene : 

"I s'pose Abe's still a-foolin' hisself 
with eddication. I tried to stop it but 
he's got that fool idee in his head, an' 
it can't be got out. Now I hain't got 
no eddication, but I git along better'n 
if I had." 

In 1851, after Abraham Lincobi had 
served a term in Congress at Washing- 
26 



THE HEART IN THE HOME 

ton, he heard that his father was very ill. 
Unable, on account of legal business, to 
go to his father's side, he wrote to his 
stepbrother, as Thomas Lincoln could 
not read his letter: 

"I sincerely hope father may recover 
his health; but at all events, tell him to 
remember to call upon and confide in 
our merciful Maker, who will not turn 
away from him in any extremity. He 
notes the fall of the sparrow, and num- 
bers the hairs of our heads, and He will 
not forget the dying man who puts his 
trust in Him." 



27 



"WHO LOVETH WELL" 

It was while clerking in a country 
store in New Salem, that young Lin- 
coln earned the nickname of "Honest 
Abe." By the kindness of his heart he 
endeared himself to everybody in the 
village. He was more than merely 
honest. A strictly just young man 
would have saved a woman's change till 
she came to the store again, and then 
would have made an honest confession 
and rectified his mistake. But Abra- 
ham Lincoln could not eat his supper 
till he had walked across the prairie 
and refunded the money to one woman 
or carried to another all the tea she had 
paid for. 

A year or so after he settled in New 
Salem young Lincoln was elected cap- 
28 



"WHO LQVETH WELL" 

tain in the Black Hawk war. He saw 
no fighting, but Captain Lincohi had a 
chance to champion the oppressed. 
The settlers had no love for "the poor 
Indian." They did not hesitate to ex- 
press their belief that "the only good 
Indian is the dead Indian." 

One day Lincoln heard some of his 
men belaboring a forlorn, helpless old 
red man, and preparing to string him up 
as a spy. The Indian showed them a 
pass, but they were hustling him along 
and threatening him, when their tall 
captain sprang out among them, his 
eyes blazing with indignation. 

"Fall back, men; fall back!" he 
shouted, his voice trembling with anger. 
"Let the Indian go — he hasn't done 
anything — he couldn't hurt you if he 
tried." 

"Say, Cap'n," said one of the soi- 
diers — "that ain't fair. We know what 
we're doin'." 

29 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

"Let this old man go. If you want 
to hurt somebody, take it out o' me. 
I'll fight you all, but you sha'n't hurt a 
helpless Indian. Wlien a man comes 
to me for help he's going to get it if I 
have to lick the whole of Sangamon 
County!" 

The big captain's challenge was not 
accepted. One of the men of that day, 
knowing the bitter enmity between the 
early western settler and the red man, 
said that Captain Abraham Lincoln 
saved the life of that Indian from the 
hatred of those lawless recruits at the 
risk of his own. But Lincoln thought 
little of his own heroism. Indeed, he 
hardly recognized the act as courage- 
ous. His own sense of fair play and 
the Indian's unspoken gratitude were 
reward enough. 

The love of his heart went out to- 
wards the unfortunate, whether man, 
30 



"WHO LOVETH WELL" 

woman, bird or beast. This tenderness 
made him the laughing-stock of his le- 
gal friends on the Eighth Circuit of 
Illinois. The lawyers used to ride 
horseback, or drive about in buggies 
from one county-seat to another, 
to try their cases. Lawyer Lincoln 
had as keen a sense of the ludicrous 
as any of them, but he often fell 
behind and was missed for hours when 
his sensitive ear detected somewhere a 
note of distress. 

Once while driving through the mud 
of Central Illinois, late in the fall, the 
country lawyer was parrying the gibes 
of his companions because of the new 
clothes he wore, for Lincoln did not 
often have a new suit. As they came 
within a few miles of the little town of 
Paris, the party's attention was at- 
tracted from Lincoln's clothes to a pig 
stuck m the mud and squealing lustily. 
Although they all laughed at the pork- 
31 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

er's absurd plight, the animaFs real dis- 
tress soon overcame even Abraham 
Lincoln's sense of the hmnorous and, in 
spite of the jeers of his comrades, he 
returned to the rescue of the hog, mud- 
dying his new clothes in the act of kind- 
ness. By laying fence-rails in the 
mire, and using one as a fulcrum, he 
pried the heavy animal out of the mud 
with another rail, and had the satisfac- 
tion of hearing its grateful grunts as it 
trotted away, flopping its ears. Half 
ashamed of his own tenderness he tried 
to ward off his friends' jokes when he 
caught up with them by explaining: 
"If that farmer lost his pig, his poor 
little children might have to go bare- 
foot all winter," 

On another occasion his companions 

were annoyed and not a little amused to 

see him hitch his horse and stride around 

in the underbrush to catch two young 

32 



"WHO LOVETH WELL" 

birds fluttering on the ground in the 
edge of a grove. Having caught the 
fledglings, he hunted from tree to tree 
till he found the nest from which they 
had fallen, and put the birds back in a 
place of safety. 

An hour or so later, when he over- 
took his friends again, they laughed at 
this childish way of wasting time. 

"Gentlemen," said he, "you may 
laugh, but I couldn't have slept well to- 
night if I had not saved those little 
birds. Their cries and those of their 
distracted mother would have rung in 
my ears." 

A Springfield lady used to like to tell 
how she was standing — as a child at her 
mother's gate, sobbing because the 
hackman had failed to come and take 
her and her trunk to the station for her 
first outing on a train, to visit a girl 
friend in a neighboring town. Mr. 
33 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

Lincoln came along just then and asked 
M^hat was the matter. The little girl 
sobbed out the heartrending story of 
her disappointment. 

"Cheer up," said the tall lawyer, 
beaming kindly down at the child; 
"we'll have to hurry." 

Shouldering the trunk, he strode 
away, while the little girl followed 
after him, drying her eyes as she ran. 
They were just in time. Putting trunk 
and girl on the train, he kissed her good- 
by and told her to "have a good time." 

"It was just like himr exclaimed 
that little girl grown to womanhood. 

When Lincoln was a country lawyer 
almost in middle life, he received his 
first five-hundred-dollar fee. What 
should he do with such a "bonanza"? 
He decided to buy a quarter-section of 
land to make his dear old stepmother 
comfortable in her old age. She could 
M 



"WHO LOVETH WELL" 

live on it and her sons could till the soil, 
and it would hold the old woman's 
family together. When he told a law- 
yer-friend what he meant to do with so 
much money, the man remonstrated 
and advised him to give the old lady a 
life-interest in the land in such a way 
that it would revert to him at her death. 
The struggling lawyer was indignant. 

*'I shall do no such thing," he said. 
*'It is a poor return, at best, for all the 
good woman's devotion and fidelity to 
me, and there is not going to be any 
halfway business about it!" 

His mother's and stepmother's rela- 
tives were all illiterate ne'er-do-wells, 
but instead of avoiding them, as none 
of his own, he seemed to feel that they 
were the more in need of his sympathy 
and help. 

During the great debates with Ste- 
phen A. Douglas, Lincoln arrived at 
Charleston, Illinois, worn out with 
35 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

speaking and travel. When his friends 
saw him going away from the comforts 
of the hotel to call on a distant relative 
of his stepmother, they remonstrated, 
reminding him how much he needed 
rest. He seemed surprised at the sug- 
gestion. 

*'Why," he exclaimed, "Aunt's heart 
would be broken if I should leave town 
without going to see her!" And he set 
out, walking through the rain several 
miles across the muddy prairie to call 
on a remote relative of his stepmother. 

People sometimes argue and disagree 
about Lincoln's religion. He knew his 
Bible and firmly believed in prayer. 
But his belief was not a mere form. It 
was the heart religion described by the 
"Ancient Mariner": 

**He prayeth well who loveth well 
Both man and bird and beast." 



36 



* WHO LOVETH WELL" 

It was a true index to his character, 
that when no one hired him to work he 
could not be content with resting or 
reading, much as he loved books. 
While staying in the house of one of his 
neighbors, among whom *'Honest Abe" 
was always welcome, he would rock the 
cradle, play with the children, joke with 
the young folks and tell his best stories 
to the aged. It was said of him in 
practical paraphrase of the scriptural 
definition of "pure religion and unde- 
filed," that he used to "visit the father- 
less and widows in their affliction, and" 
— cho2) their wood! 



37 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

Mr. Lincoln used to talk of love 
among the dusty books of his dingy 
law-office. 

"Did you ever write out a story in 
your mind?" he asked a friend one day. 
"I did when I was a little codger. One 
day a wagon, with a lady and two girls 
and a man, broke down near us, and 
while they were fixing up, they cooked 
in our kitchen. The woman had books 
and read us stories, and they were the 
first of the kind I ever heard. 

"I took a great fancy to one of the 
girls, and when they were gone I 
thought of her a great deal, and one 
day, when I was sitting out in the sun 
by the house, I wrote out a story in my 
38 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

mind. I think that was the beginning 
of love with me." 

His first love was Ann, the comely 
daughter of the keeper of Rutledge's 
Tavern, where he boarded, for a time, 
at New Salem. Abraham and Ann 
studied grammar together, and the tall 
boarder soon lost his heart. This must 
have been when he learned how she had 
been treated by her affianced, a young 
man named McNamar, who had gone 
east and had not even been heard of for 
a long time. No doubt the element of 
pity intensified his affection for the 
young girl. William O. Stoddard, at one 
time President I ancohi's private secre- 
tary, has written fully of this love affair : 

"It is not known precisely when Ann 
Rutledge told her suitor that her heart 
was his, but early in 1835 she permitted 
it to be understood that she would 
marry Abraham Lincoln as soon as his 
39 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

legal studies should be completed. 
That was a glorious summer for him; 
the brightest, sweetest, hopefulest he yet 
had known. It was the fairest time he 
was ever to see; for even now, as the 
golden days came and went, they brought 
increasing shadow on their wings. 

*'0n the 25th of August, 1835, just 
before the summer died, Ann Rutledge 
passed away from earth — but she never 
faded from the heart of Abraham Lin- 
coln, and the shadow of that great dark- 
ness never entirely lifted from him. It 
was then that he discovered, in a strange 
collection of verses, those lines of Wil- 
liam Knox, ever afterward his favorite 
poem, beginning: 

" 'Oh why should the spirit of mortal be proud ?' 

"There were well-grounded fears 

that he might do himself some injury, 

and a watch was vigilantly kept. He 

had been, to that hour, a man of mar- 

40 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

velous poise and self-control, but, when 
they came and told hiin she was dead, 
his heart and will, and even his brain 
itself gave way. He was frantic for a 
time, seeming to lose even the sense of 
his own identity, and all New Salem 
said: *Abe Lincoln's insane!' He pit- 
eously moaned and raved: 

" *I never can be reconciled to have 
the snow, rain and storms beat upon her 
grave.' " 

Too much has been made, by several 
of Lincoln's biographers, of his so- 
called love affair with Mary Owens. 
Years after Miss Rutledge's death 
Miss Owens came to visit her married 
sister in New Salem. The sister an- 
nounced her intention of making a 
match between Mary and Abe Lincoln. 
That of itself was enough to prevent 
their caring much for each other. 
Lawyer Lincoln called on Miss Owens, 
41 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

and wrote several letters to her after his 
removal to Springfield, apparently con- 
sidering himself under a sort of obliga- 
tion to marry the girl on accomit of all 
her sister had said. 

But Miss Mary Owens was a young 
lady of spirit, as well as good looking 
and intelligent, and she promptly cut 
the Gordian knot by refusing her reluc- 
tant suitor outright. 

When Lawyer Lincoln went to 
Springfield to practise law, he had been 
a member of the State Legislature at 
Vandalia, and had been the leader of a 
group of tall men, known as "the Long 
Nine," who brought about the removal 
of the State capital to Springfield. 
But the young lawyer from New Salem 
was poor. At first he slept in the loft 
above the store of a young Kentuckian 
named Joshua Speed until he was able 
to occupy better quarters. About this 
42 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

time Speed hired, for "sweeper-out" 
and clerk, a lad they called "Billy" 
Herndon, who soon developed aspira- 
tions of his own. 

"Give the boys a chance" was a motto 
of Lawyer Lincoln's. He started in to 
help "Billy" become a lawj^er, as Major 
Stuart had hel]3ed him. 

After he went into partnership with 
Major Stuart, Mr. Lincoln kept on 
helping Billy in his law studies. While 
he was Judge Logan's partner Lincoln 
learned to be a better lawyer himself, 
and he used all his knowledge for the 
benefit of Billy Herndon. When the 
law partnership of Logan and Lincoln 
was dissolved, Mr. Lincoln, against the 
advice of his friends, took Billy into the 
firm and hung out a "shingle" with 



LINCOLN & HERNDON 
43 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

in bright, fresh letters which remained, 
though tarnished, after the senior part- 
ner had gone to Washington to be 
President of the United States. Billy, 
with all his foster-partner's help, could 
not bear anything like half the burden 
of the business. He could stay in the 
office, make engagements, entertain 
waiting clients, and try easy cases in the 
senior partner's absence. He did not 
even sweep or dust the office as he 
had done in Speed's store. But all 
this made no difference to Mr. Lin- 
coln. 

Billy had little occasion to keep 
books, for when the chief collected a fee 
he would come in, seat himself at the 
rickety little office table and say, 
"Come, sit down, Billy, let's divide." 

Then he would proceed to count out 
what he was pleased to call "Herndon's 
half," and push it across to Billy's side 
of the table. 

44 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

The largest fee Mr. Lincoln ever re- 
ceived was five thousand dollars from a 
great railroad lawsuit, and Herndon 
records in his "Life of Lincoln": "He 
gave me my half as coolly as he would 
have given a few cents for a paper." 

Among those who had been kind to 
Abe Lincoln in the early New Salem 
days was Jack Armstrong, the Clary's 
Grove bully the new clerk had to fight 
to a finish to establish his reputation as 
a young man of parts in that rough 
community. Armstrong and his wife, 
Hannah, became staunch friends and 
admirers of "Honest Abe." When 
Abraham Lincoln was out of employ- 
ment he often visited the Armstrongs. 
After he became famous it was Mrs. 
Armstrong's boast that — 

"Abe would come out to our house, 
drink milk, eat mush, corn-bread and 
butter, bring the children candy, and 
45 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

rock the cradle while I got him some- 
thing to eat. 

"I foxed his pants, and made his 
shirts. . . . He would nurse babies, and 
do anything to accommodate anybody. 
Lincoln has stayed at our house two or 
three weeks at a time." 

When the baby Lincoln had rocked 
grew up, he got into sore trouble. He 
was accused of murder. When Law- 
yer Lincoln learned of this he wrote to 
Hannah, the boy's mother — for Jack 
Armstrong was now dead, the follow- 
ing letter: 

''Springfield, 111., Sept., 1857. 
"Dear Mrs. Armstrong: 

*'I have just heard of your deep 
affliction and the arrest of your son for 
murder. 

"I can hardly believe that he can be 
capable of the crime alleged against hmi. 
"It does not seem possible. I am 
46 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

anxious that he should be given a fair 
trial, at any rate; and gratitude for 
your long-continued kindness to me in 
adverse circumstances prompts me to 
offer my humble services gratuitously 
in his behalf. 

"It will afford me an opportunity to 
requite, in a small degree, the favors I 
received at your hand, and that of your 
lamented husband, when your roof af- 
forded me a shelter, without money and 
without price." 

The Armstrong trial became a cele- 
brated case. Mr. Lincoln drew out the 
chief accusing witness, who testified 
that he saw "Duff" Armstrong strike 
the fatal blow by moonlight — then 
proved by the almanac that the moon 
was not shining at that hour. 

Armstrong was acquitted. It was a 
labor of love for Lawyer Lincoln. 
The young man and his widowed 
47 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

mother sobbed in each other's arms, 
then turned to thank their tall ben- 
efactor. "Duff" Armstrong pushed 
through the crowd and gi*asped his de- 
liverer's hand, but he could not speak. 
"Tears of gratitude filled the yoimg 
man's eyes, expressing far more than he 
could have done by words." 

"The course of true love never did 
run smooth" with Abraham Lincoln. 
While he was in partnership with Ma- 
jor Stuart, his partner's cousin, Mary 
Todd, came from Louisville, Kentucky, 
to live with her sister, Mrs. Ninian W. 
Evans, in Springfield. 

Of course, the rising young attorney 
soon met the Kentucky belle. Miss 
Todd was bright, witty and accom- 
plished. She was at home in good so- 
ciety and seemed to possess everything 
Mr. Lincoln so sadly lacked. From 
their first meeting he became her ardent 
48 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

admirer. He found her brilliant, viva- 
cious and ambitious. She had boasted 
to her girl friends that she meant some 
day to be mistress of the White House. 

There was apparent rivalry between 
the "Little Giant" of the West, Ste- 
phen A. Douglas, and Abraham Lin- 
coln. These two men were opposites 
in build, temperament, education and 
character, and became life-long com- 
petitors. No doubt it was Lincoln's 
heart and sincerity that finally won the 
favor of Mary Todd. They were re- 
ported to be engaged. They had an 
understanding at least. But he was 
morbid, and often melancholy, and she 
was high-strung. Their "understand- 
ing" soon became a grievous misunder- 
standing. 

Lincoln grew more and more melan- 
choly, and his bosom friend invited him 
to Kentucky, where Speed was then liv- 
ing, happily married. There the sad 
49 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

swain recovered, to a degree, his men- 
tal balance. Returning to Springfield 
he threw himself into politics. He 
published a humorous letter, in the 
county paper, against the State Audi- 
tor, James Shields, a vain, pompous 
little Irishman, and signed it "Rebecca 
of the Lost Townships." 

This was followed by another "Re- 
becca" letter, not written by Lincoln, 
but by Miss Todd and a girl friend. 
The points in it were sharp, not pohti- 
cal as Lincoln's had been, but personal 
and therefore offensive. Shields called 
on the editor in a rage and demanded 
the name of the writer. 

Lincoln told the editor to give his 
name only, thus making himself re- 
sponsible for both letters. Shields 
challenged him to a duel. Lincoln ac- 
cepted, choosing ridiculous weapons, 
and imposing absurd conditions which 
revealed the fact that, though Shields 
50 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

would have done his best to kill Lincoln, 
he was unwilling even to hurt Shields. 
When they came face to face, explana- 
tions were possible, and the foolish duel 
was averted. 

Miss Todd's heart must have softened 
toward the tall knight who had stood 
ready to risk his life for her sake, for 
they were married early in the Novem- 
ber following the summer of the "Re- 
becca" letters. 

The story, however, that Lincoln 
failed to appear at his own wedding, 
after Miss Todd's family had prepared 
the marriage supper and Mary had 
donned her bridal attire, is not true. 
This story first appeared in Herndon's 
"Life of Lincoln" and has been re- 
peated till it is beheved by millions of 
people, in spite of the fact that it has 
been denied and disproved a hundred 
times by intimate friends of the fami- 
lies concerned. 

51 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

Mrs. Lincoln joined her husband's 
friends in opposing his undue consid- 
eration for William Herndon. But 
this was useless, Mr. Lincoln would 
brook no interference with "Billy," who 
did not seem to appreciate the kindness 
of his chief. He did not even keep the 
office in decent order. 

Aside from his failure to do what he 
could not, and his disposition not to do 
what he could, Billy took to drinking. 
This gave his fatherly partner the keen- 
est anxiety, for Lincoln was a temper- 
ance man. He was more anxious for 
Billy's sake than for his own, detrimen- 
tal as were the junior partner's habits 
to their business. 

His wife's ambition and tact led 
Mr. Lincoln to run for Congress, and 
he was elected over the Rev. Peter 
Cartwright, the famous backwoods 
preacher. While he was away at the 
national capital Herndon got into 
52 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

petty complications, and well-nigh 
ruined their business by drinking and 
negligence. Not content with that, he 
wrote complaining letters to the senior 
partner in Washington. Congress- 
man Lincoln wrote long and patient re- 
plies to "poor Billy," describing all that 
was going on around him and treating 
the young man at home as if he were the 
sufferer instead of the offender. He 
humored Billy thus, still hoping for bet- 
ter things. 

After returning to Springfield — ^he 
declined to run for Congress again be- 
cause of other men who needed and de- 
sei^ed the honor! — he found matters 
going from bad to worse. Instead of 
taking up the work where he had left 
off, he had to revive it. Billy, besides 
receiving half the earnings of the busi- 
ness, was a drain upon it, for Mr. Lin- 
coln had to bail him out and pay dam- 
53 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

ages in saloons where Herndon and his 
rowdy associates had broken mirrors 
and furniture during their nightly 
carouses. 

When Billy failed to show up at the 
office in the morning, Mr. Lincoln was 
in suspense until he learned what had 
become of him. Following his fears he 
had little difficulty in finding his erring 
partner. These experiences recurred 
with sickening regularity. 

An acquaintance heard Mr. Lincoln 
say to himself one morning, as he sprang 
up the courthouse steps two at a time, 
''I can't let Billy go to jail!" 

Of course, Herndon would cry and 
promise to amend, and his soft-hearted 
partner would grasp both the young 
man's hands in his and, choking back a 
sob, his deep gray eyes filling with 
tears, he would say: 

"Z believe in you, Billy. I'm sure 
you'll do better now. Let this be a les- 
54 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

son to you — a warning! Brace up, my 
dear boy, and we'll beat yet." 

But Abraham Lincoln's great, yearn- 
ing heart was hoping against hope. 

Mrs. Lincoln's devotion, thrift and 
ambition must have done much to in- 
spire and advance her husband in his 
wonderful career. She once said of 
him : 

*'Mr. Lincoln was the kindest man 
and the most loving husband in the 
world." 

Whenever anything occurred that 
would gratify her ambition, his first 
thought was of "little Mary." When 
he received the telegram announcing his 
nomination for the presidency of the 
United States, he exclaimed, as he 
pulled himself out of a crowd of con- 
gratulating fellow-citizens : 

"There's a little woman down on 
Eighth street who will be glad to hear 
55 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

the news — you must excuse me while I 
tell her." 

The night of November 6, 1860, 
when Mr. Lincoln learned, about mid- 
night, that he was elected President, he 
hurried home and burst into the room 
in which his wife lay asleep, exclaim- 
ing: 

"MaiT! Mar2j! Mary! WE'RE 
ELECTED!" 

Soon after this an old woman, whom 
Mr. Lincoln knew as "Aunt Sally," 
came from New Salem to say good-by 
to "Honest Abe," before he "went to 
Washington to be the President." The 
President-elect was standing in the 
spacious room placed at his disposal in 
the State Capitol, talking with two men 
of national renown, when the old 
woman came in, shy and embarrassed. 
He saw his old friend at once and hur- 
ried across the room to meet her. Tak- 
56 



THE HEART OF LOVE 

ing both her hands in his, he led her to 
the seat of honor. Presenting his dis- 
tinguished visitors to her, he tried ten- 
derly to reassure her and put her at ease 
by saying, as reported by Miss Tarbell : 

"Gentlemen, this is a good old friend 
of mine. She can bake the best flap- 
jacks you ever tasted for she has baked 
them for me many a time." 

After quite a long stay Aunt Sally 
pulled out from her basket a huge pair 
of coarse yarn socks she had knit for 
Mr. Lincoln. Taking the stockings by 
the toes, he held one down each side of 
his gigantic boots, exclaiming: 

*' She's got my latitude and longitude 
about right, hasn't she?" 

Then, in simple words, he expressed 
his thanks to the good old woman for 
her thoughtful kindness, promised to 
wear those very socks in the White 
House, and to think of her as he did so. 

Great joker as Mr. Lincoln was, 
57 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

with his dominant sense of humor, he 
was incapable of winking behind the 
back of any person who had been kind 
to him. He never said or did things 
for mere pohteness' sake. He liad 
none of the veiieer of society, but pos- 
sessed the sohd heart of oak. 



58 



"GREAT-HEART" IN THE WHITE 
HOUSE 

On that memorable Monday, Febru- 
ary 11th, 1861, President-elect Lincoln 
took his leave of Springfield, at the 
railroad station, with the following 
brief utterance — according to the sten- 
ographic report of a newspaper corre- 
spondent, who was himself an avowed 
infidel : 

"My Friends: — No one not in my 
position can appreciate the sadness I 
feel at this parting. To these people 
I owe all that I am. Here I have lived 
more than a quarter of a century; here 
my children were born, and here one of 
them lies buried. I know not how soon 
I shall see you here again. A duty de- 
59 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

volves upon me which is, perhaps, 
greater than that which has devolved 
upon any man since the days of Wash- 
ington. He would never have suc- 
ceeded except for the aid of Divine 
Providence, upon which he at all times 
relied. I feel that I cannot succeed 
without the same Divine aid which sus- 
tained him, and in the same Almighty 
Being I place my reliance for support; 
and I hope you, my friends, will pray 
that I may receive that Divine assist- 
ance, without which I cannot succeed, 
but with which success is certain. 
I bid you all an affectionate farewell." 

At Indianapolis, on their roundabout 
route to Washington, Robert Lincoln, 
then a youth of seventeen, lost the trav- 
ehng bag which contained his father's 
Inaugural Address. The Honorable 
Robert Todd Lincoln, during the cen- 
tennial celebration of his father's birth, 
60 



"GREAT HEART" 



made the following correction of this 
popular but mistakenly told story : 

*'In the first place, it did not happen 
at Harrisburg, as is generally reported, 
but at Indianapolis. When we entered 
the old Bates House there I set my 
valise down with those of the others of 
our party, in the hotel office, and they 
were all, mine among the rest, carried 
away and put in a small room back of 
the clerk's desk. I soon missed the bag 
and was greatly alarmed because Father 
had confided to me its precious contents, 
the only copy of his Inaugural, which 
he had written before leaving Spring- 
field. 

" I went at once and reported the loss 
to him and, together, we had a search 
made. The missing vahse was soon 
found. There is no truth whatever in 
the story that Father opened another 
'gripsack' just like his, and found 'a 
flask of whiskey, a pack of cards and a 
61 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

soiled paper collar!' Nor did he take 
out the Inaugural, put it in his pocket, 
and tell a cheap, ill-fitting story, as one 
biographer, whose data were furnished 
him by Herndon, states with great 
elaboration. 

*'This is what actually happened: 
He handed me the bag, and said gently, 
'There, Bob, see if you can't take care 
of it now.' That was more like him. 
He believed in giving his own boys, as 
well as others, a chance. He showed 
that he trusted me with his most valued 
possession, and you may depend on it 
I was faithful to that trust!" 

Abraham Lincoln went to Washing- 
ton with an aching heart. He lived 
every day as if it were his last on earth. 
He had much before him which he hoped 
to be able to do. He found chaos 
everywhere — a panic of statecraft in 
the North, an epidemic of anarchy in 
62 



GREAT HEART" 



the South. The leading minds of the 
country seemed to have gone daft. 
They advocated the most foolhardy 
schemes. Seward, his greatest rival, 
now his Secretary of State, actually 
proposed that President Lincoln should 
keep his hands off the helm and let him, 
Seward, steer the Ship of State! Sew- 
ard and Chase, and later, McClellan 
and Stanton, each felt that he, himself, 
alone, was divinely appointed to save 
the Union. 

They did not believe in their chief. 
The party that had elected Lincoln 
looked on with misgivings. They felt 
that the people, after all, had been car- 
ried away by their boundless enthusi- 
asm, so that the "Rail-Splitter" had 
been washed up into the White House 
by a tidal wave of popular frenzy, and 
left there high and dry like a stranded 
sea monster out of his natural element. 

When President Lincoln's subordi- 
63 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

nates insulted him by patronizing him, 

"He knew to bide his time." 

He rephed to Secretary Seward with 
the masterful tenderness he had shown 
to his stepbrother ten years earlier, 
when John proposed a scheme about as 
foolish and visionary as the Secretary 
of State's plan for getting up a war 
with England! 

Mr. Lhicohi had practised ruling his 
own spirit and forgiving in advance; 
in his dealings with his father, he had 
learned many lessons in self-repression, 
self-denial and self-sacrifice, while 
smarting under his sense of the injus- 
tice done him when he was called lazy 
and a shirk, as he lay beside his wooden 
shovel, trying to study by the flickering 
firelight — preparing himself, heart and 
soul, for these veiy crises m his life. 

There was something more than 
64 



"GREAT HEART" 



human in Abraham Lincoln's charity. 
No mortal man was ever more possessed 
of the love that "suffereth long and is 
kind; — beareth all things, believeth all 
things, hopeth all things, endureth all 
things." 

People understood him the more 
slowly because of his many stories, 
which were so unexpected and strange 
that those who heard them failed to 
comprehend their deep import. When 
self-appointed delegations came to pro- 
test against this or to urge that, the 
kindness of his heart always rescued the 
situation with a story. 

And those stories! The sympathy 
in them was exquisite. Instead of hid- 
ing a sting they were full of balm and 
the oil of gladness for the smarts and 
wounds of his listeners. Men some- 
times scoffed because Lincoln laughed 
while relating them. But he did not 
65 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

laugh at his stories so much as with his 
hearers, from the pure joy of giving 
pleasure. If ever there was "a face 
illumined" by the glowing heart behind 
it, it was Abraham Lincoln's. That is 
why a woman left him one day, exclaim- 
ing: 

"They say 'Mr. Lincoln's an ugly 
man.' It's a wicked lie — I think he has 
the loveliest face I ever saw!" 

It may have been "homely," but Mr. 
Lincoln's face was never "ugly." It 
often shone "like the face of an angel," 
for his fervent sympathy made him like 
an angel of light to many a breaking 
heart. 

It was his heart that prompted the 
Emancipation Proclamation long be- 
fore it was promulgated — but his head 
held it back until the fullness of the time 
was come. Then he announced it with 
fear and trembling, but afterwards his 
heart rejoiced. 



GREAT HEART" 



The Gettysburg Address is warm 
with the rare love of Lincoln's life. 
There is a new story, which illustrates 
his ever ready sympathy — of a shy old 
Quakeress who fainted in front of the 
speaker's stand shortly before he rose 
to deliver that immortal address. He 
saw the crowd pressing tighter around 
her, so he came at once to the rescue. 

"Here," he commanded, "hand that 
lady up to me." Tenderly placing the 
unconscious woman in the rocking- 
chair reserved for himself, he half-knelt 
beside her, so when she began to revive, 
she found herself being fanned anx- 
iously by the President of the United 
States — in the face and eyes of about 
fifteen thousand people ! This was too 
much for the shrinking old lady in plain 
garb. 

"I — feel — better now," she pro- 
tested feebly. "I want — to — to go — 
back there," pointing to where her hus- 
67 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

band stood looking up at her in won- 
dering solicitude. 

"O, no, indeed!" laughed Mr. Lin- 
coln kindly. "You're all right up here. 
It was all we could do to pull you up 
out of that crowd, and we could never 
stick you down into it again !" 

Thus reassured the simple old lady 
forgot the thirty thousand eyes while 
she listened, sitting among the most il- 
lustrious men of her day, to a short, 
simple speech — but one of the sublimest 
addresses ever delivered. 

A young theological student, named 
Henry E. Jacobs, had worked his way 
up close to the speaker's platform dur- 
ing Edward Everett's two-hour ora- 
tion. He has recently described Mr. 
Lincoln's manner in delivering his brief 
address on this great occasion. 

"I watched the President closely," 
said the Rev. Dr. Jacobs, fifty years 
68 



GREAT HEART" 



afterward. "When lie saw that ISIr. 
Everett's long oration was drawuig to a 
close, he took from an inside pocket two 
or three small leaves of paper and be- 
gan to read them with his eye-glasses 
perched near the end of his nose, glanc- 
ing furtively over them to right and 
left, like a schoolboy about to be called 
on to recite a poorly prepared lesson. 
But he gave the closest attention to the 
final words of the orator of the day, 
and, becoming absorbed, he absently 
crammed his mussed-up manuscript 
back into the capacious pocket. 

"During the singing of a dirge, writ- 
ten by a Gettysburg man. President 
Lincoln drew forth the few pieces of 
paper and conned them over till the 
time came for him to deliver it. 

"Holding those few precious pages, 

now in one hand, now in the other, he 

looked at them casually — his glasses 

still astride the tip of his nose — as if 

69 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

reading — until he came to the closing 
words, 'of the people, by the people, 
for the people,' he held the little sheets 
straight down before him in both hands 
and bowed as he pronounced the prep- 
ositions 'off 'hy' and 'fof — to right, 
to left and to the front — then, straight- 
ening up to his full height, he spread 
out his long arms (the pages were then 
in his right hand) as he impressively 
uttered the final words, 'shall not — 
perish from — the earth.' 

"It is absurd to say the President 
was not applauded on that occasion. 
He was interrupted several times, and 
roundly cheered at the close of his 
speech. 

"Not a train left Gettysburg all day 
until the President's special went out 
that night. In the afternoon there 
were some services in the Presbyterian 
church. I don't remember who the 
70 



"GREAT HEART" 



speaker was — but he was not a man of 
national renown. 

"Yet President Lincoln insisted on 
going to hear him. He invited Secre- 
tary-of- State Seward to accompany 
him, then sent for old John Burns, the 
village cobbler, who had gone into the 
fight in his Sunday clothes and distin- 
guished liimself for bravery. He was 
afterward immortalized by Bret Harte 
as the hero of the ballad 'John Burns of 
Gettysburg.' The President invited 
the Gettysburg cobbler to go with him 
to the church and it was the proudest 
hour in John Burns's life when he 
marched through the streets of the town 
with the President of the United States 
on one arm and the Secretary of State 
on the other. 

"In this simple act Mr. Lincoln 

meant to honor every hero in the town, 

for there were other men of Gettysburg 

who had risked and given their lives for 

71 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

their country in that three days' con- 
flict — the greatest battle in the heroic 
history of the world." 

As to the speech itself, it seems 
strange now that of all men, Edwin 
M. Stanton, the Secretary of War, who 
was not even present at Gettysburg on 
that occasion, should have been among 
the first to appreciate the simple gran- 
deur of the Gettysburg Address. 
Stanton — rude, sneering, caustic, con- 
temptuous Stanton — who had taken 
almost devilish delight in insulting 
Lincoln when they first met, eight 
years earlier, in the great McCormick 
Reaper case — Stanton, who had called 
Mr. Lincoln a gorilla, an imbecile 
and a fool — with many a profane ex- 
pletive — up to the very day the Presi- 
dent made him war secretary! Mind 
alone could never have conquered the 
obdurate soul of Secretary Stanton. 
It was Lincoln's heart that wrought 
72 



GREAT HEART" 



this greatest miracle of his Hfe. 

In spite of Stanton's atrocious treat- 
ment of him, President Lincoln recog- 
nized the sterling worth and patriotism 
of his motives so he said he was glad to 
bear Stanton's snarling ways for the 
good the Secretary could do the nation. 
People at home and abroad freely criti- 
cized Mr. Lincoln for allowing his Sec- 
retary of War to oppose and stultify 
him in so many ways, often doing and 
saying trivial, annoying things. But, 
little by little, as a trainer breaks a frac- 
tious horse, Lincoln tightened his rein, 
until one day, with the utmost kindness, 
yet with adamantine firmness, the 
President said: 

"Mr. Secretary, it will have to be 
done." 

And it was done. 



73 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

A colored seamstress in the White 
House tells a sad story of Lincoln's 
love for his children. Willie, the 
second living son, had taken a severe 
cold, but the doctor said there was no 
danger, and advised Mrs. Lincoln to 
go on and give a grand reception for 
which thousands of invitations had been 
issued. While this function was in 
progress in the East Room it was found 
that Willie was very ill indeed. 

"During the evening Mrs. Lincoln 
came upstairs several times and stood 
by the bedside of the suffering boy. 
She loved him with a mother's heart, 
and her anxiety was great. The night 
passed slowly, morning came, and 
Willie was worse. He lingered a few 
74 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

days and died. God called the beau- 
tiful spirit home, and the house of joy 
was turned into a house of mourning. 

"I was worn out with watching, and 
was not in the room when Willie died, 
but I was immediately sent for. I as- 
sisted in w^ashing and dressing him, and 
then laid him on the bed, when JMr. Lin- 
coki came in. I never saw a man so 
bowed down with grief. He came to 
the bed, lifted the cover from the face of 
the child, gazed at it long and earnestly, 
murmuring: 

" 'My poor boy! He w^as too good 
for this earth. God has called him 
home. I know he is much better off in 
Heaven, but then we loved him so ! It 
is hard — hard — to have him die!' 

"Great sobs choked his utterance. 
He buried his head in his hands, and his 
tall form was convulsed with emotion. 
I stood at the foot of the bed, my eyes 
full of tears, looking at the man in si- 
75 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

lent, awe-stricken wonder. His grief 
unnerved him, and made him hke a 
weak, passive child. I did not dream 
that his rugged nature could be so 
moved; I shall never forget those 
solemn moments. There is a grandeur 
as well as a simplicity about the picture 
that will never fade. 

"Mrs. Lincoln was inconsolable. In 
one of her paroxysms of grief the Presi- 
dent kindly bent over his wife, took her 
by the arm and gently led her to a 
window. With a stately gesture he 
pointed to the lunatic asylum, as he said : 

" 'Mother, do you see that large white 
building on the hill yonder? Try to 
control your grief or it will drive you 
mad, and we may have to send you 
there.' " 

This anxious warning was no misap- 
prehension. Mary Todd's girlish ambi- 
tion to be mistress of the White House 
76 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

had been fulfilled — but with how many 
sorrows! The President's mansion 
was a house of mourning nearly all the 
time the Lincolns lived in it, until the 
terrible tragedy that drove them out of 
it. Mrs. Lincoln never again went 
into the room in which Willie died, nor 
would she enter the Blue Room after 
his funeral was held there. 

Although the Lincolns had lost their 
baby boy, Eddie, years before leaving 
Springfield, the death of Wilhe almost 
unhinged the reason of the fond 
mother, and weighed down the father's 
life with a sadness he never could shake 
off. An attendant in the White House 
saw the President walking up and down 
the spacious chamber, and heard him 
saying to himself: 

"This is the hardest trial of my life. 
Why is it? Why is it?" 

A caller, wishing to comfort the 
heart-broken President, told him that 
77 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

good people all over the land were 
praying for him. He replied grate- 
fully: 

"I am glad to hear that. I want 
them to pray for me. I need their 
prayers." 

The chastening effect of this great 
grief was manifest in many ways. He 
told an intimate friend that this be- 
reavement had brought him closer to 
the Father than any j)revious experi- 
ence. When he, as President-elect, 
said good-by to his Springfield neigh- 
bors, he referred to "Divine Provi- 
dence" in the abstract. But as the cares 
and responsibilities of the nation 
weighed liim down, the divine Being 
came to present Himself as a concrete 
personality. His accountability to 
God, as well as to the people, made him 
take a common-sense view of his own 
weakness and need of help. He said to 
Noah Brooks, a Western newspaper 
78 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

correspondent who often called at the 
White House: 

"I should be the veriest shallow and 
self-conceited blockhead upon the foot- 
stool if, in the discharge of the duties 
that are put upon me in this place, I 
should hope to get along without the 
wisdom that comes from One who is 
stronger and wiser than all others." 

He remarked to a distinguished min- 
ister from New York, not long after 
the beginning of the war: 

"If it were not for my firm belief in 
an overruling Providence it would be 
difficult for me, in the midst of such 
complications of affairs, to keep my 
reason on its seat. But I am confident 
that the Almighty has His plans and 
will work them out: and so, whether 
we see it or not, they will be the wisest 
and best for us." 

Different members of the President's 
79 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

life-guard have told of finding him 
dressed and reading the Bible before 
the rest of the family were up in the 
morning; and of seeing him on his 
knees in an agony of prayer long after 
the others had retired for the night. 

While friends were urging him to 
emancipate the slaves, President Lin- 
coln prayed a good deal. This atti- 
tude of mind, referred to by members 
of the Cabinet, is revealed in the closing 
words of the Emancipation Proclama- 
tion : 

"And upon this act, sincerely be- 
lieved to be an act of justice warranted 
by the Constitution, I invoke the consid- 
erate judgment of mankind and the 
gracious favor of Almighty God." 

He issued this proclamation when he 
felt sure that it could be delayed no 
longer. "Public sentiment would sus- 
tain it — many of his warmest friends 
and supporters demanded it — and he 
80 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

had promised God that he would do it." 
Before this he had talked much with 
some of his advisers of his belief that 
God would perform the impossible. 
Yet delegations of ministers came to 
coach the President concerning the will 
of God, as though there were no direct 
way for him to find out the divine plan. 
One day, when he had the Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation all ready, and in his 
pocket waiting for the right juncture 
of the war and affairs of State before 
announcing it, a clergyman called and 
asserted, with solemn unction, that he 
had received a special revelation that 
the right psychological moment for 
freeing the slaves had arrived, and that 
he had come from Chicago to bring the 
divine message. 

'*Well, now, ain't that strange?" said 

the President, with a smile the minister 

did not then understand. "Here I am, 

studying that very question day and 

81 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

night, for weeks and months — and I 
am the one to act in this important 
matter, too — so ain't it rather odd that 
the only channel the Divine Master can 
send this message by is the roundabout 
route by way of that awful, wicked city 
of Chicago?" 

The pious reflections and exhorta- 
tions of ministers and others who as- 
sumed to have a monopoly of heavenly 
wisdom, tried even Abraham Lincoln's 
long-suffering patience. Once, "in the 
burden and heat of the day," a clergy- 
man said, with unctuous solemnity, "I 
Jiope the Lord is on our side." 
Mr. Lincoln promptly answered: 
"I am not at all concerned about that 
— but it is my constant anxiety and 
prayer that / and this nation shall be 
on the Lord's side!" 

More than a year after Willie's 
82 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

death the President remarked to a vis- 
itor : 

"I made a solemn vow before God 
that if General Lee was driven back 
from Pennsylvania I would cro^vn the 
result with a declaration of freedom to 
the slaves." 

It was natural to a man whose re- 
ligion was a matter of experimental 
common sense to find a crisis in his re- 
ligious life in the great crisis of the life 
of the whole nation. After the battle 
of Gettysburg the President went to 
call on General Sickles, who had lost a 
leg in an engagement there. Mr. Lin- 
coln related to the wounded general his 
religious experience in connection with 
the great battle: 

*'I had no fears for Gettysburg, and 

if you really want to know I will tell 

you why. In the stress and pinch of 

the campaign there, I went to my room 

83 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

and got down on my knees and prayed 
Almighty God for victory at Gettys- 
jburg. I told Him that this is His 
country and the war is His war, but 
that we really couldn't stand another 
Fredericksburg or Chancellorsville. 

"And then and there I made a 
solemn vow with my Maker that if He 
would stand by the boys at Gettysburg 
I would stand by Him. And He did, 
and I will! 

*'After this, I don't know how it was, 
and it is not for me to exj^lain, but 
somehow or other, a sweet comfort 
crept into my soul, that God Almighty 
had taken the whole thing into His 
own hands, and we were bound to win 
at Gettysburg." 

In the last year of his life a minister 
from Illinois asked President Lincoln 
if he was a Christian! Instead of re- 
senting this impertinence, as many a 
84 



HIS CHANGE OF HEART 

man in his position would have done — 
especially a man who, in his letters, 
speeches, conversation and daily life 
had given unmistakable evidences of 
his devotion — ]Mr. Lincoln replied as 
simply as a child: 

"When I left Springfield I asked the 
people to pray for me: I was not a 
Christian. When I buried mj^ son — 
the severest trial of my life — I was not 
a Christian. But when I went to Get- 
tysburg and saw the graves of thou- 
sands of our soldiers, I then and there 
consecrated myself to Christ." 



85 



HIS LOVE FOR LITTLE TAD 

Mr. Lincoln seldom spoke of Willie. 
Robert was away at Harvard. When 
he came home from college he went 
right to the front as one of General 
Grant's aides. Thus only Thomas, 
nicknamed "Tad, the pet of the na- 
tion," was left at home. The boy was 
passionatel}^ affectionate — his father's 
inseparable companion. A word from 
the father would make the boy laugh 
gleefully, or melt him to tears. He did 
not seem to wish for any other play- 
mate. One of the President's life- 
guard has recorded that the only times 
jMr. Lincoln ever seemed happy were 
while they were romping through the 
stately rooms of the Executive Man- 
sion together, whooping like wild In- 
86 



HIS LOVE FOR LITTLE TAD 

dians, playing horse, carrying the boy 
"pickaback," or holding him high on his 
shoulders, where he had been in the 
habit of carrying both boys when Willie 
was playing too. The loss of the older 
boy seemed to intensify the father's de- 
votion to little Tad. 

At such times the boy's small cup of 
joy was brimful, and he expressed it 
by chuckling and shouting: 

"Papa-day! O Papa-day!" 

The little fellow had an impediment 
in his speech, due to a slight cleft in his 
palate, so that strangers could not 
readily understand him. But his 
father understood his afflicted boy — 
every word! No matter who was witli 
the President, or what grave matters 
might be discussed by Seward, Stanton 
or Sumner — if little Tad spoke, his 
father was all attention, bending fondly 
down to the boy, for the time oblivious 
87 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

of all else. Senators and secretaries 
were sometimes annoyed by Tad's in- 
terruptions, but their very impatience 
seemed to intensify Mr. Lincoln's 
yearning over his lonely, afflicted son 
with a passion of tenderness which was 
much more than mere doting indul- 
gence. 

During the long, grave Cabinet 
meetings Tad played about, falling 
asleep on the floor or climbing into his 
father's lap and taking a nap there. 
He accompanied the President to For- 
tress Monroe, and, clinging to his fath- 
er's hand, they stalked and trotted 
through the streets of fallen Richmond 
together. 

While the President was making his 
last, happy speech from the northern 
portico of the White House, in re- 
sponse to a serenade congratulating him 
because the war was over, little Tad 
88 



HIS LOVE FOR LITTLE TAD 

stood by, grabbing the leaves of his 
father's manuscript as he dropped them 
for the boy to catch. When they 
floated down too slowly to suit him. 
Tad tugged the tails of the President's 
long black coat and demanded in a 
shrill, piping voice: 

*'Give me 'nother paper, Papa-day!" 

It was at the close of this carefully 
written address, beginning, "We meet 
this evening, not in sorrow, but in glad- 
ness of heart," that the President, as he 
was about to retire within the mansion, 
called out to the serenading "Northern" 
band to play "Dixie," joyously adding, 
"We have a right to 'Dixie' nowl" 

This expression of his heart-love for 
the South, in spite of all the bitterness 
fostered against him in the rebelling 
States, was Lincoln's last public utter- 
ance. 

When he went into the house Mrs. 
Lincoln called his attention to the fact 
89 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

that he might easily have been shot 
while speaking, and begged him not to 
expose himself so recklessly again. 

According to a trusted servant in the 
White House, President Lincoln, dur- 
ing the last week of his life, spoke in 
the highest praise of General Robert E. 
Lee. Robert Lincoln had just re- 
turned from Virginia with General 
Grant, and showed a photograph he 
had of the Confederate commander to 
his father. The President gazed ear- 
nestly at the picture and remarked to 
his son: 

"It is the face of a noble, brave man." 

Before the sad death of "Stonewall" 
Jackson, he had been heard to say of 
the Southern general: 

"Lie is a brave, Presbyterian soldier. 
If we, in the North, had more such gen- 
erals, this war would not drag along 
so." 

90 



HIS LOVE FOR LITTLE TAD 

Lincoln, a Southerner himself, and 
married to a Southern lady, had great 
tenderness for the South. There was 
a compartment in his private cabinet 
crammed with threats of assassination. 
To these he never referred except to 
say there was no use of taking precau- 
tions or "gettin' skeert," as he pro- 
nounced it. 

*'If they want to kill me," he said with 
a smile, "they'll do it somehow." 

He lived his life "with a heart for any 
fate," in the spirit of the Man who 
breathed out His love for all mankind 
on the first Good Friday, long ago, 
saying: 

"Father, forgive them, they know not 
what they do." 

Good Friday, 1865, fell on the four- 
teenth of April. They had the regu- 
lar Cabinet meeting — Lincoln's last. 
At its close they congratulated the 
President on his improved appear- 
91 . 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

ance already, for his face had grown 
more and more ghastly and drawn and 
anxious all through the terrible days 
and nights of the war. To Stanton he 
looked no longer like a gorilla or an im- 
becile, for the war secretary remarked 
that day to the Attornej'^ General, 
"Didn't our chief look grand to-day!" 

That very night the conquering hero 
became, in fact, what he had long been 
at heart — a martyr. The next morn- 
ing, at twenty-two minutes after seven, 
when the heart of Lincoln ceased to 
beat, it was Stanton — heart-conquered, 
loyal, devoted, loving, heart-broken 
Stanton — who closed the dying eyes of 
his tender-hearted chief; then he turned 
away, his whole frame shaking with 
suppressed emotion as he whispered 
tenderly : 

''Now he belongs to the ages!" 



92 



THE HEARTBROKEN PEOPLE 

The world stood aghast, and the 
American people were stricken with 
grief. Even the Southern leaders sud- 
denly realized that the South had lost 
its best friend in the North. As for 
the Northern people, they met on Pa- 
triots' Day (April 19th) in their own 
places, in city and country, and 

"Wept with the passion of an angry grief/' 

while the simple funeral services were 
going on in the East Room of the 
White House. Twenty-five miUions 
of men, women and children are esti- 
mated to have gathered all over the civ- 
ilized world and sobbed out their sor- 
row over the death of the well-beloved 
President. Strong men, never known 
93 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

to weep over their own troubles or pri- 
vate sorrows, broke down and cried like 
little children when they heard of the 
murder of Abraham Lincoln. 

But Lincoln did not become a multi- 
millionaire in hearts at a single bound. 
The people mourned the man more 
than the President. It was by no acci- 
dental combination or sequence of 
events that the whole world wept by 
Lincoln's bier. He began by endear- 
ing himself to his own family, and a 
few backwoods relations and neighbors. 
Then New Salem learned to love him, 
as it never loved any one else. So of 
Springfield and the Eighth Judicial 
Circuit of Illinois. 

When the supporters and henchmen 
of Seward, Chase and Cameron came 
to that Chicago Convention, in 1860, 
they utterly failed to comprehend Lin- 
Going's strange popularity. In their 
94 



HEARTBROKEN PEOPLE 

perplexity they did not grasp the fact 
that they were contending with the 
"principahties and powers" of Abra- 
ham Lincohi's tender and all-inchisive 
heart. 

They laughed at the very idea of a 
"rail-splitter president," and sneered 
at his "coarse, clumsy jokes." Then 
they tried to account for all they could 
not comprehend by calling him "a man 
of the people." This was true in a 
sense, but only in the highest sense. 
Lincohi was "the man with a heart" — 
and the people saw through and recog- 
nized him as the one "man after their 
own hearts." 

Douglas, his life-long rival, knowing 
something of his popularity, remarked 
when he heard of Lincoln's nomination : 
"Every tar-barrel in Illinois will be 
burning to-night." This enthusiasm 
spread all over the North like a prairie 
fire. 

95 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

On a tidal wave of heart responding 
to heart, Lincohi was carried 

"From prairie cabin up to Capitol." 

During the war, which quickly fol- 
lowed, a large part of the patriotism of 
the soldiers was their personal love for 
Abraham Lincoln. To them he seemed 
the living personification of their coun- 
try, threatened and wronged. ''Father 
Abraham" meant more to them even 
than "Uncle Sam," in those awful days. 

When President Lincoln issued call 
after call for soldiers, and for more 
soldiers, and still more, men and boys 
seemed never to tire of responding: 

"We are coming, Father Abraham, 
Three hundred thousand more." 

Americans are sometimes accused of 
a certain lack of patriotism because 
they fail to rise when "The Star- 
Spangled Banner" is played, some- 
96 



HEARTBROKEN PEOPLE 

times flippantly, in a musical medley. 
But the men and boys of '61, as well as 
those of '76, give the lie direct and 
eternal to all such false accusations. 
Patriotism, in the United States of 
America, is much more than a feeling 
which finds its expression and satisfac- 
tion in mere matters of sentiment and 
etiquette — it is the religion of country. 

The *'Boys in Blue" said among 
themselves, in exulting tones when 
they spoke of Lincoln, "He cares for 
us! he loves us!" and they cheerfully, 
and even humorouslj^ — to be like him — 
marched into the jaws of death for his 
dear sake. It was a far different love 
from that inspired in his generals and 
grenadiers by Napoleon, for their loy- 
alty flagged and failed. They knew 
that Napoleon's ambition was for him- 
self first, then for them, as a means of 
gaining it. It was Napoleon's want of 
97 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

heart that made hhn a colossal failure, 
while Lincoln's self-giving soul crowned 
his life, though he was murdered, with 
success immortal. Almost from baby- 
hood Lincoln was a burning and shining 
light emblazoning in letters of living 
fire his own illustrious words : 

"With malice toward none; with 

charity for all." 

• ••••• 

Where Tad had been the night 
of Lincoln's assassination no one knew, 
but Thomas Pendel, the faithful door- 
keeper of the White House, relates 
that the boy came in very late at the 
basement door and clambered up the 
lower stairway, crying — "Tom Pen! 
Tom Pen! They've killed Papa-day! 
They've killed my Papa-day!" 

They brought Mrs. Lincohi home in 
a state of collapse. The only wonder 
is that the horrible scene in which she 
98 



HEARTBROKEN PEOPLE 

had participated did not rob her of 
reason altogether. During the gusts 
of grief to which she gave way in spite 
of herself, little Tad would look up at 
her in terror, and cry out: 

"Don't cry so. Mamma, or you'll 
break my heart!" 

Then the sorrow-stricken mother 
would crush the child in a passionate 
embrace, cover his upturned face with 
kisses and tears, and summon all the 
resolution she could for his sake. 
Standing between his mother and his 
small brother, poor Robert had need of 
all the manly tenderness of his nature 
— "so hke his father's," they said. 

The terrific strain was too great for 
the desolate little woman, widowed by 
the most hideous cruelty, and she lay 
utterly prostrated, imable to go on that 
winding journey from Washington to 
Springfield, and be present at the burial 
99 



THE HEART OF LINCOLN 

of the bodies of her husband and Wil- 
lie — unable for many weeks even to 
leave the White House to the new 
President, Andrew Johnson, and his 
large family. 

Poor little Tad was lonely. He 
missed his father sadly. He would 
wander through the great, empty rooms 
as though he were looking for some one. 
Many times a day he was heard to 
murmur : 

"O Papa-day! where's my Papa-day? 
I'm tired of playing by myself. I want 
to play ^together' — only a little while — 
just this once, please, Papa-day!" 

His sense of loneliness invaded even 
his dreams. The ever-watchful door- 
keeper, or one of the life-guard, would 
he down beside the little fellow and try 
to soothe and comfort him through the 
long, troubled nights. 

One minute he seemed, in his dreams, 
to be romping once more with his great, 
100 



HEARTBROKEN PEOPLE 

tali playfellow, gurgling, chuckling and 
crying out: 

^"Papa-day! O Papa-day!" 

Then the sense of his great loss pene- 
trated his sleep, and he would sob out, 
"O Papa-day, where's my Papa-day?" 

"Your papa's gone," said the life- 
guard, hoarsely — *'gone to Heaven." 

Little Tad listened and his eyes 
opened wide. "Do you think Papa- 
day's happy there?" he asked eagerly. 

"Yes, yes, I'm sure of it, Taddie 
dear, your papa's happy now." 

"O, I'm glad, so glad!" sighed the 
little boy — "for Papa-day never was 
happy here." 



THE END 



101 



